Universal Health Care in Vermont? Only If Obama Administration Allows.

Firedoglake and Physicians for a National Health Program

Petition to Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services

Vermont has enacted a law that will put the state on a path towards achieving a universal health care system. The people, many in the state legislature and the governor of Vermont have expressed a desire to go even further to a universal single payer health care system, one which will guarantee coverage of medically necessary care and will control health care costs. If achieved, this will serve as an important model for our nation.

Federal law prohibits the people of Vermont from achieving a fairer, more effective health care system until the state receives several, critical federal waivers from the Department of Health and Human Services. Without these waivers from HHS, Vermont will be unable to most effectively deal with federal programs like Medicaid, Medicare and the new Affordable Care Act, and thus unable to integrate the many pieces of our fractured health care insurance reality into a better coherent and unified system.

We, the cosigned, urge Secretary of HHS Kathleen Sebelius to provide the state of Vermont with maximum flexibility to help achieve affordable healthcare for all. The administration and all relevant federal departments should grant Vermont favorable terms on any and all waivers from federal law it requests to make this plan for a better health care system a reality.